I supervisedthe boys as they dressed in their new clothes. A bath, a nap, and food had greatly improved their appearance. Fiona had taken the scissors to Bleu’s hair and with shorter locks, it was much more obvious they were twins. Although Beaumont’s face was still swollen and one eye was practically sealed shut.
When they were properly dressed, I escorted them out to the sitting room where Fiona and James were in deep conversation, heads bent together. They startled when we came into the room and jerkily drew apart, then peered at us with guilty expressions.
They’d been talking about me. What had he told Fiona? West gave me a reassuring smile, putting me at ease. He wouldn’t betray my confidence.
“Ah, there are my little gentlemen,” Fiona said. “Mr. West, may I present to you Bleu and Beaumont.”
The boys nodded. James placed a hand on each of their heads and looked them in the eye. Then he spoke to them in remarkably good French. What couldn’t he do?
The boys did as he asked and sat together on the sofa, close enough that their knees touched. Beaumont shook slightly, but Bleu’s eyes blazed with fight. If I had to guess, it had been Bleu who had kept them alive.
Through a series of coaxing questions from James, we were able to piece together more details about their background. They’d been orphaned after their mother died of some kind of illness. Neither knew what had killed her, only that she had fallen ill and never recovered. Before her death, they’d lived in a small room in one of the poorest sections of Paris, according to James anyway. When James asked about their father, Bleu lifted his narrow shoulder and said they had never known him. He’d died when they were infants. Their mother had done the best she could, working in a factory during the day while the boys stayed alone. When their mother died, the landlord shoved them out to the street. They wandered, begging for scraps of food, and somehow surviving the winter. When they were approached about fighting, Bleu had not hesitated to say yes. The fights gave them enough to eat for a week if they were careful with the money. “Des voleurs tout autour de nous,” Bleu said. Thieves everywhere.
Fiona sat very still while the boys spoke and James translated. Her usually expressive face was set in a stoic mask. For once, I couldn’t tell what she was thinking.
I couldn’t understand everything the children said, but I understood Bleu when he asked what it was we wanted them to do. What was the payment for the food and clothes? “Vous voulez quoi en échange de la nourriture et des vêtements? On doit faire quoi pour vous?”
The frightened glint in his eyes as he waited for our response shattered me. What must he think? What horrible ideas had come to him about what we would take from them in exchange for staving off their starvation for however long we kept them?
James told them that we didn’t want anything from them. He explained that Fiona had a kind heart, especially for children. “She wants you to have food and shelter and go to school,” James said to them in French. “Vous n'aurez plus à vous battre.” You won’t have to fight anymore.
Bleu looked from one of us to another, as if he couldn’t quite be sure we were for real.
“Mais pourquoi?” Beaumont asked, surprising us by using his voice for the first time. But why?
Why indeed? How would Fiona explain?
“Tell them it makes me sad to see them hungry and without shelter,” Fiona said. “I want to help them. Say that, please. Make sure they understand I’ll take care of them from now on.”
James translated, conveying Fiona’s sentiments. When the boys seemed to have reached their limit with all the questions, Gabriella took them into the kitchen for another meal.
Before they left with Gabriella, Fiona smiled at both the boys. Bleu smiled back at her, a tentative one that showed a mouthful of rotten teeth. These children need so much, I thought. Was taking them across the ocean to a country where they didn’t speak the language or know a soul the correct course? It was such a Barnes thing, believing the answer to everything was in Emerson Pass. But maybe she was right?
After the boys left the room, James poured himself a drink and collapsed into an easy chair. “What a thing you’ve done, Fiona.”
“I don’t want to be lectured,” Fiona said. “By either one of you.”
“Fiona.” I spoke as calmly as I could, not wanting to hurt her but worried just the same that she would have her hopes crushed by the realities of government. “We don’t know anything about adoption or immigration laws. It might be best to proceed with caution. I don’t want you to have your hopes up only to have them come crashing down when we talk to the authorities.”
“You have such little faith,” Fiona said to me.
My lack of faith seemed to be the theme of today. I filled with even more affection for James when he said, “You know, Fiona, he has a point. Until we know more about immigration and adoption laws, it might be best not to plan too far ahead.”
“We don’t have influence here like we might at home,” I said gently.
Fiona gave us both scathing looks before going to the liquor cabinet and pouring herself a glass of wine. She drank wine before dinner now? Paris had corrupted her. Instead of sitting on her own chair, she perched on the arm of James’s. “No, but Papa might. He has powerful connections here. He’ll know what to do.”
I took one end of the sofa and glanced toward the window, thinking about what she’d said. Would Lord Barnes be able to use his influence to push something like this through? On the other side of the glass, a fat robin perched on the sill.
“If not, we’ll just stow them away on the ship,” Fiona said. “Like Sandwich did with the old man who brought her here.”
“What?” I asked, not following.
“Never mind. You’re too provincial to hear about that now,” Fiona said. “Once you’ve been here a few weeks, you’ll understand.”
I rolled my eyes but had to chuckle. “All right, let me know when you think I’m ready.”
“You’re barely older than them,” I said. “What are you thinking?”
She flushed red. Her slender frame straightened, and she looked for a moment as though she might strike me. I knew she wouldn’t, of course, but the way her fists clenched at her sides reminded me of Flynn right before he threw a punch. “I’m old enough to know my own mind, no matter how often you try to change it.”
“I’m only pointing out the perils involved here,” I said. “We don’t know these children. They’re French. Taking them to America won’t be as easily done as it would be at home where the Barnes family is law."
“We’re not law. Papa only does what he thinks is best.”
“Regardless, this isn’t as easy as deciding to take them home with us,” I said. “You’re not prepared to raise them on your own.”
“Maybe I will.” She jutted her chin out and glared at me, reminding me of Cymbeline. “What do you care? It’s not as if it will affect your life.”
“I don’t want you burdened by all this,” I said. “You’re young. You have your whole life ahead of you. Marriage, a family of your own.”
“I didn’t say I was adopting them,” Fiona said.